The Thirty Years' War, fought primarily in Central Europe between 1618 and 1648, was one of the most destructive conflicts in European history. An estimated 4.5 to 8 million soldiers and civilians die
The siege and capture of Bautzen by John George I, Elector of Saxony, in September 1620, contemporary engraving by Matthäus Merian the Elder
Dutch ships ramming Spanish galleys in the Battle of the Narrow Seas during the Eighty Years' War, October 1602
19th-century depiction of the Third Defenestration of Prague (1618), which marked the beginning of the Bohemian Revolt, and therefore of the first phase of the Thirty Years' War.
The Battle of White Mountain, oil painting by Peter Snayers
The Peace of Westphalia is the collective name for two peace treaties signed in October 1648 in the Westphalian cities of Osnabrück and Münster. They ended the Thirty Years' War and brought peace to t
Thirty Years' War
…Sweden turned the empire into one theatre of a wider struggle with their Habsburg rivals, Emperor Ferdinand III and Spain. Fighting ended with the 1648 Peace of Westphalia, whose terms included greater autonomy for states like Bavaria and Saxony, Swedish territorial gains in northern Germany, as well as Spain's acceptance…
The historic town hall of Münster where the treaty was signed
Dutch envoy Adriaan Pauw enters Münster around 1646 for the peace negotiations.
Sebastian Dadler undated medal (1648), Christina of Sweden, portrait with feathered helmet right. Obverse
The reverse of this medal: Christina of Sweden as Minerva holding an olive branch in her left arm and grasping the tree of knowledge with her right hand.