State Formation in Europe, 843–1789

A Divided World

Sverre Bagge

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2019
• Print ISBN: 9780367185640
• eBook ISBN: 9780429589539
• Topic: History
• Subtopic: European History
• Index: History

State Formation in Europe, 843–1789 follows the formation and development of the European state from the division of the Carolingian Empire to the French Revolution.

The book's primary focus is on Europe's patterns of internal and external development in comparison to political organization in other parts of the world. By analysing Europe as a single unit, rather than dividing it into nation states, it reveals the broader historical connections within the Continent. Bagge takes the reader through a discussion of how kingdoms evolved into states, introducing the influence of the Church and the town on these state structures. The relationship between state, Church and town is traced to explain how these different power struggles played out and why the territorial state became the dominate form of organization. Finally, the book clarifies why Europe developed in this way and the global consequences of this development.

By observing Europe through the perspective of the rest of the world, readers gain insight into trends common to the whole Continent while crossing the traditional border between the Middle Ages and early modern period. This book is essential reading for students studying medieval and early modern political history, state formation and Europe in a global context.

1

THE FORMATION OF THE EUROPEAN STATE SYSTEM

In a pamphlet published in 1637, the Jesuit Guido Aldeni reported that his Chinese friends, when told about the many kings in Europe, asked how Europeans could avoid war. Aldeni’s answer was that the problem was less than it seemed, because the kings were related by marriage and, if a war broke out, the pope might intervene to stop it.¹ We do not know whether the Chinese were convinced by these arguments, but in any case, modern historians and social scientists have to admit that they were right in their assumption: the division of Europe did lead to almost constant war and competition. However, modern scholars also tend to think that this competition was a dynamic element, which forms part of the explanation for Europe’s later supremacy.

In trying to explain this division, we first have to note that great empires are not the normal political organization of world civilizations, i.e. the parts of the world characterized by intensive agriculture, urbanization, social stratification and organized government. It goes without saying that societies of hunters and gatherers are not organized as empires. Permanent settlement, agriculture and a certain population density are necessary for the formation of states and empires, which, within Eurasia, are mainly to be found in a zone stretching across the Continent, mostly between around 20 and 40 degrees north, ‘the lucky latitudes’, as Ian Morris calls them. This area has a temperate climate and is the home of 50 out of 56 edible plants and 9 out of 14 large mammals domesticated by humans.² The corresponding latitudes to the south might have had similar advantages, at least climatically, but they cover much less land, respectively in South America, South Africa and Australia, divided by large stretches of sea.

To the extent that we can talk about a ‘normal’ pattern among historical civilizations, it must be periods of empire alternating with periods of division. This applies to India, the Middle East and the Mediterranean region. Thus, both China and Europe are exceptions, China forming a great empire during most of its history since 221 BC and Europe being divided into various numbers of political units since AD 843 at the latest.

Terrain and ecology are often used to explain this feature of Europe.³ The Alps, the Pyrenees and the Carpathians form strong barriers between north and south. The great plain north of the Alps would seem easier to unite, but a number of rivers, mostly going from south to north, create problems for the movements of armies. In the early Middle Ages, large parts of this area were also covered by forest, which, of course, increased the difficulty. However, nor should the geographical difficulties in China be underestimated; China is actually more mountainous than Europe.⁴ More important is the fact that it was apparently more densely populated, with a large part living in the fertile areas along the rivers Yang-Zse-Kiang and Hoangho. Rivers had a similar importance in Europe, particularly in the flat areas north of the Alps but there were more of them, so that the population was more dispersed. Moreover, rice, the main staple in southern China, yields more than grain and thus allows a greater population density than in Europe. Finally, it has been pointed out that China covered a smaller area than Europe – China, at the time of unification, was significantly smaller than it is today. Nevertheless, China was far from easy to unite; the conquerors had to cross high mountains and numerous rivers, whereas Europe north of the Alps would seem relatively easy to cross.⁵

A less distant example of unification is the Roman Empire which covered the lands around the Mediterranean combined with parts of Western Europe. If the Romans had not conquered this area, it would have been easy to find reasons why it could never have been united; the lands along the northern coast of the Mediterranean are extremely mountainous and the whole area was never united again after the fall of the Empire. The original core area of the Empire, Italy, was one of the most divided parts of Europe until the nineteenth century. When the Romans nevertheless managed to conquer the Mediterranean area, the explanation must be sought in their superior military tactics and organization: heavily armed and armoured as well as trained and disciplined infantry,⁶ and, above all, in the political field. Although they were ruthless in war, they were also able to make defeated enemies into allies that could be used for new conquests.

Once united, however, the Empire had the advantage of the sea as a communication area, where provisions for Rome and other great cities could be transported on ships, armies could be moved to conquer new areas and crush rebellions and cultural exchange could take place. By contrast, no such line of communication existed between the inland parts of the European Continent north of the Alps, which became the centre of medieval and early modern Europe. Admittedly, Europe as it developed during the Middle Ages, had a northern parallel to the Mediterranean, namely, the North and Baltic Seas. Here, however, the sailing season was shorter and the surrounding areas less densely populated.

Actually, both these seas became European in the Middle Ages and most of the following period – the Ottoman dominance of the eastern Mediterranean in the sixteenth and parts of the seventeenth century was the main exception – but in a different way from the Roman period. The dominant forces were divided, partly in different states and partly in cities or leagues of cities. This points to an important difference between the Roman Empire and its successors in the following period, not only the competition between states but also the greater independence of merchants and city communities.

Most large empires seem to have been formed by nomads or warlike peoples in the highlands or outskirt areas invading wealthy and densely populated agricultural regions. This applies to the Persian, Arab, Mongol and Ottoman Empires. It does not directly apply to the Romans, although they were clearly less culturally and economically advanced than the peoples they conquered, first, various peoples in Italy, including Etruscans and Greeks, then the countries in the Eastern Mediterranean. China shows a somewhat similar pattern. The principality of Qin, which carried out the unification of China, was relatively poor and situated on the outskirts of the cluster of competing countries. China was divided into a number of petty principalities over a period of around 1000 years (c. 1200–220 BC). A gradual reduction of the number of polities took place during this period, until only seven were left between 475 and 221.⁷ Finally, one of them, the Qin, conquered the others and founded the first imperial dynasty, which was shortly afterwards (202) replaced by the Han. The unification of China was extremely bloody. There were almost continuous wars between 770 and 221. Up to 8–20 per cent of the population was mobilized in the army, against 1 per cent in Rome and even less in early modern Europe. The casualties were apparently also enormous, estimated at up to 450,000 in a single battle. Although the sources may exaggerate, this nevertheless suggests a different scale than in Europe, where the Romans are said to have lost 50,000 men in their greatest defeat, the Battle of Cannae in 216 BC.

As we are dealing with a culturally homogeneous area with almost constant competition, it is difficult to explain Qin’s victory by specific technological or organizational differences; nor can the final victory of one principality be regarded as inevitable, although the intensity of the competition makes this more likely than in the case of Europe. The main factor would seem to be better organization and larger armies, which was developed gradually, notably from the mid-fourth century.⁸ Once the country had been united under the Qin and Han dynasties (221 BC–AD 220), later divisions always proved temporary, despite a period of more than 300 years between the fall of Han and the rise of Sui and Tang from 581.

Turning to Europe after the fall of the Roman Empire, we can identify one factor that made the emergence of a great empire unlikely, namely, the absence or relative absence of invasions. After the Germanic invasions that led to the fall of the Roman Empire in the west, no invaders managed to conquer large parts of Europe. Magyars and Slavs formed kingdoms in East Central Europe and Scandinavian Vikings raided large parts of the British Isles and the Continent but did not permanently change the political geography of any larger part. The Mongols invaded Poland and Hungary in the thirteenth century and caused considerable damage, but withdrew quickly. They only made a lasting impact further east, destroying Kievan Rus, while modern Russia, centred on the principality of Moscow, developed partly in alliance and partly in conflict with the Mongols. Finally, the Ottomans posed a serious threat in the late fifteenth and early sixteenth centuries, but by that time, European fortifications and military technology had been sufficiently developed to limit their advance to the Balkan area. Thus, neither conquest from the outside nor defence against such a conquest led to the formation of a European empire. Europe could enjoy the luxury of a number of units competing with and fighting each other without risking conquest from outside.

The relative absence of invasions may be explained partly by the distance from the core area of the nomads in Central Asia and partly by the poverty of early medieval Europe. The Eastern Mediterranean and the Middle East were more attractive areas, at least until the thirteenth century. Nevertheless, these factors are hardly sufficient to explain why Europe did not become a great empire; we also have to examine the actual formation of political units after the fall of the Roman Empire in the west. This will also address the second big question raised by the comparison: how and why was there a system of relatively stable smaller units rather than fluctuations between larger and smaller ones? And what explains the actual divisions between the European kingdoms?

After the fall of the Roman Empire, there would seem to have been an open future. Admittedly, the Roman provinces of the western parts of Europe, Italy, Spain, Gaul and England, might form a point of departure but with the partial exception of Gaul, all of these underwent radical changes in the following period. There also seem to have been few existing divisions within the new areas that were eventually included in Western Christendom. Thus, the formation of the later state system began in the early Middle Ages. If we want a precise date, the treaty of Verdun in 843, which divided the Carolingian Empire between the three sons of Louis the Pious, seems the most obvious. Admittedly, it was later replaced by several other treaties and there was no awareness at the time that this was a permanent division, nor did the three units much resemble states in the modern sense. However, the division between the two main powers on the Continent, France and Germany, became permanent. Later conquests and/or conversion to Christianity led to the establishment of new kingdoms.

In explaining these developments, we must first eliminate a factor that has played a considerable part in earlier historiography and has seen some revival after the Fall of Communism in 1989, namely, the idea of the state as the expression of national identity.⁹ As we shall see, national ideas were not without importance in the medieval and early modern period, but they are not able to explain the origins of states. Taking the most obvious expression of national identity, language, there are relatively few language groups in Europe which only partly correspond to national borders. The three main Indo-European language groups are Romance, Germanic and Slavonic, distributed respectively in the south and west, the centre and north and the north and east. In addition, there is Celtic in the west, parts of Britain and France, and Baltic in Northern Germany and along the Baltic Sea, now confined to Lithuania and Latvia. Finally, there are the non-Indo-European languages Basque in the Pyrenees and Finno-Ugric in Finland, Estonia and Hungary. The languages are localized in a way that in many cases led to the dominance of one language or language group – although mostly with considerable differences between dialects. However, states were created from above, not from below, so to the extent that language was important, it was that of elites. Besides, the liturgical and administrative language was often Latin, which reduced the importance of linguistic differences.

By contrast, terrain would seem an obvious factor. There are also some clear examples of this. The Pyrenees form a natural border between France and the Spanish kingdoms, although even this border was disputed. The Alps separate Italy from the areas to the north, but this did not prevent the German and French kings from interfering in Italy and, from the sixteenth century, together with the king of Spain, dominating most of the peninsula. Further north, both Hungary and Bohemia had core areas in the form of lowland protected by mountains, whereas Poland lacks this and had more changing borders.

The sea can divide as well as unite. It is striking that the earliest and most stable borders are to be found along the Atlantic coast. Later, the middle zone, along the Rhine and the other great rivers as well as across the Alps, became the most divided, whereas the Eastern zone, dominated by the kingdoms of Poland, Bohemia and Hungary and larger German principalities like Saxony and Prussia, was in an intermediate position.¹⁰ Whereas the Atlantic coast formed an efficient border, the situation was different in the Mediterranean and the North and Baltic Seas. The original borders between the Scandinavian countries were established at a time when the most important military power was sea power; therefore, the southern part of what is now Sweden plus most of the surrounding islands belonged to Denmark, while Norway got hold of a sea empire to the north and west.¹¹ Aragon established a sea empire from the thirteenth century onwards in the Mediterranean, and England expanded across the sea to Ireland and across the Channel to France.

Nevertheless, terrain explains relatively little. Most of the central part of the European Continent consists of flat land, increasingly cultivated from the last centuries of the first millennium onwards, with no obvious divisions in the terrain. In the south, the Iberian and Apennine peninsulas are both mountainous, but the former developed strong kingdoms which were eventually reduced to two, whereas the latter became one of the most divided parts of Europe. Similarly, France and Germany are topographically fairly similar but politically different; France united under one king and Germany divided into around 400 principalities. Moreover, the most divided parts of Germany were not the forested and mountainous parts in the south and east, but the intensely cultivated ones in the west and the centre. Further north, the highly divided Low Countries present the same picture. Thus, rather than being determined by topography, the borders must be the results of some kind of human activity, the most obvious of which is warfare. However, as will be shown in the following, dynasties and group formation are even more important factors.

Warfare and state formation: from the age of invasions to the eighteenth century

Arguing that war was the driving force in the formation of the European state, Charles Tilly points to the existence of around 1,000 states in medieval Europe which were eventually reduced to 25. However, he fails to examine the chronology of this process, which, as we shall see, does not support his argument. Comparing China until the formation of the Empire in 221 BC with Europe in the early modern period, Victoria Hui also points to warfare as the main factor determining the development in both places. Nevertheless,...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Dedication
• Table of Contents
• Preface
• Introduction
• 1. The formation of the European state system
• 2. The foundation and development of European monarchy
• 3. The state and its competitors
• 4. The revolutions of the sixteenth century and their consequences
• 5. Absolutism and constitutionalism
• 6. The state and the Enlightenment
• Conclusion: The state of the Old Regime and its legacy
• References
• Index