31.3 Europe: a.d. 1601 to 1700  (Page 2/30)

Practically all the armies of Europe had adopted the military reforms initiated at the end of the previous century by Maurice of Holland. (See page 792). This resulted in obedient, responsive units of soldiers able to function efficiently in any part of the globe. The new drill and techniques spread from officers trained at Maurice's Military Academy, which was founded in 1619, first to Sweden, then to the northern Protestant European states and finally to France and eventually Spain. (Ref. 279 ) (Continue on page 942)

Southern europe

Eastern mediterranean islands

Continuing their take-over of Mediterranean islands, the Turks conquered the Cyclades and all of Crete except two off-shore Venetian forts. The Hospital of the Knights of Malta became a kind of teaching institution, treating patients from all over Christendorr. In 1653 Louis XIV of France gave the Knights four Caribbean islands, but they soon sold them to the French West India Co. (Ref. 38 , 86 ) (Continue on page 944)

Greece and upper balkans

Greece and most of the Balkans were under Ottoman rule although several Christian communities had survived and there was some degree of local autonomy by the prelates of Greek and Serbian churches. Many of the men of those western Christian Balkans fought as mercenaries, either for Venice or Constantinople. The Turks helped Istran (Stephen) Bocskay drive the Austrians out of Transylvania in 1605 and by the Austro Turkish Treaty of Zsitva-Torok, this area was left to his control. (See also HUNGARY, this chapter). (Ref. 222 , 279 )

Commercial agriculture became increasingly important with cotton, tobacco, wheat and maize produced by entrepreneurs, a feature which led to the diminution of military land-holding. After 1638 there was no more recruiting of Christian boys for Ottoman administration and the army and this, in turn, meant a widening gap between Christian and Moslem, landlord and peasant, village and town. Eventually this shift in relationships destroyed the Ottoman polity. (Ref. 139 ) Travel in the Balkans could be precarious and in open country travelers deployed their carriages in a circle at night, with everyone ready for defense, just as in the American west, centuries later. (Ref. 260 )

The great Venetian Admiral Francesco Morosini captured the Peloponnesus and laid siege to Athens in 1687. One of his shells hit a powder magazine which the Turks had stored in the Parthenon and it blew up, reducing the structure to its present state. (Ref. 131 ) The City of Senj of Croatia was the home of the Christian, Uskok pirates and Venice had to make war against them from 1613 on in order to protect its trade and its coastal regions such as Cattaro, Corfu and Levkas. We have noted above that near the end of the century Albanians became the grand viziers of Turkey. (Ref. 8 ) (Continue on page 946)

Italy

Italy continued in an age of invasion with the monarchs of Europe and petty Italian princes fighting over its territory. Most of the old ruling families of the city-states were dying out and Italy had little history of its own in this century. Even Venice fell into some decline and only in its war with Turkey was there some vestige of its earlier glory. The wealthy class of that city-state now abandoned trade and put all its resources into farming. Still, thanks to foreign shipping, Venice remained a very busy port. It was the rise of agricultural prices that drove Venetian capital to the land. (Ref. 292 ) Genoa lost its island of Corsica and for reasons still debatable, its credit collapsed. Braudel (Ref. 292 ) believes that it had to do with a change in the discount rate of bills of exchange. A bill had to acquire value as it went from country to country, or someone lost all. The plague obviously did not help. The Black Death killed a million people in north Italy between 1628 and 1631 and in Genoa there were perhaps 700 rich nobles left out of about 80,000 inhabitants. In Venice there were only 14 or 15 wealthy patricians lef t who were capable of holding high state positions. Florence barely existed, being little more than the Grand Duke's court. He had seized everything - money, the right to govern and distribute honors. (Ref. 260 ) In spite of all these troubles in Italy, active Jewish colonies survived for many years in Piedmont, Venice, Mantua and Ferrara. Jews even launched Leghorn on a prosperous new career in this century. (Ref. 292 )