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Fontana History of Europe
Europe Unfolding, 1648-1688
The revised edition of this classic text covers both the turbulence of war which raged throughout this period, and explores how, alongside such turbulence, it was possible for some countries to both flourish and produce spectacular advances in art, science and thinking.
- GenresHistoryEuropean History
416 pages, Mass Market Paperback
First published January 1, 1969
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October 5, 2018By rights this needs to be a multi-media review, resplendent with Lully and Purcell as much with illustrations of magnificent curly wigs and the people they sat upon. However this review due to the technical limitations of the form, will proceed as the book itself does with an austerity and simplicity of form inappropriate to it subject. In my opinion this is the best of the volumes in the Fontana history of Europe, at least of the ones I've read and remember, series simply because of the fairly equal coverage it provides to the Ottoman Empire and Muscovy as well as the western European countries that typically get the most pages in these types of books, and there is a good deal of Denmark too. Despite that it could not stand toe to toe with The Pursuit of Glory. As it is a more limited book, seeking only to paint a four hundred page picture of forty years of European political history, with as little of social and economic history as can be got away with, in the 1960s when this was first written those elements were felt to be more distinct or more in need of special treatment than one might today. Cultural history does slightly better with a chapter on the European mind and the prevalent sense of background - this young woman heading off to an assignation with a Spanish gentleman will be the aunt of Dominico Scarlatti, and just up that street and round the corner, a few years from now, Giambattista Vico will be born.
Still overall this a period stained with warfare. The overview of the peace achieved after years of negotiation in Germany in 1648 was followed by civil disturbance in France and England and a ferocious and wide ranging war over almost all of Poland-Lithuania, which suggests asking a child to put up a sheet of wall paper and then sitting back to sip your tea as you watch them chase the air bubbles around. No sooner it seems are swords beat back into ploughshares in one country than in another church bells are melted down for cannon. The Swedes, then determined to achieve with musket and pike, what Ikea now does with flat pack furniture and meatballs, are particularly astonishing, exceeded only by the balletic leap of Louis XIV into an unprecedented choreography of warfare, advancing across the stage of Europe in vibrant costume and well considered steps.
Shockingly in a book of this sort there are brief asides to England and developments within that Sceptered Isle as though it were an integral part of Europe as opposed to a freebooting island wandering the Atlantic in search of plunder - a sure sign of a book published in 1969.
As I was being stung on the face by a burst of hail it struck me that I particularly like the section on the European mind as for at least a couple of pages on Jansenism helped Pascal to drop into place in my mind. There is a way in which reading is a journey through Lisa's labyrinth or takes Kalliope's spiral as its natural mode of progression and that, I at least, come across things not in a natural order but in a disconnection or repetitive manner that might oblige me more to reconsider, perpetually, than if I had through some other life, happened upon a more ordered plan of reading.
Here I had the curious fact of seeing the dog eared pages and occasional dried jasmine flower that I had previously read this book one summer in the back garden of my parent's first bought house, although I had no specific memories of reading it, a realisation that must qualify any recommendation implicit, explicit or accepted I make of this book.
I liked the idea of the political value of extravagance, and that Colbert's careful involvement of Louis XIV in the financial administration of France through regular reports and meetings may not have convinced the monarch of the knife edged dance of managing the whole mess, but rather assured him of the vast degree of expertise and skill that could be relied upon to finance his art of Kingship.
Fouquet defended himself against Colbert's accusations in part by arguing: The expenses of the state would not have been met, for the most urgent needs & necessities, nor pay given to the troops...if I had not provided them; & I would not have been able to provide them if my wealth, my expenditure, my splendour of life & my liberality, together with the notice taken of my absolute reliability, had not given me credit (p195) , which is in itself a summary of the style of Louis XIV - by living large he demonstrated financial capacity and wooed investors at one and the same time as satisfying his vision of himself. Of course somebody had to pay, but nobody listens to the little people. It all seems a bit contemporary.
Still overall this a period stained with warfare. The overview of the peace achieved after years of negotiation in Germany in 1648 was followed by civil disturbance in France and England and a ferocious and wide ranging war over almost all of Poland-Lithuania, which suggests asking a child to put up a sheet of wall paper and then sitting back to sip your tea as you watch them chase the air bubbles around. No sooner it seems are swords beat back into ploughshares in one country than in another church bells are melted down for cannon. The Swedes, then determined to achieve with musket and pike, what Ikea now does with flat pack furniture and meatballs, are particularly astonishing, exceeded only by the balletic leap of Louis XIV into an unprecedented choreography of warfare, advancing across the stage of Europe in vibrant costume and well considered steps.
Shockingly in a book of this sort there are brief asides to England and developments within that Sceptered Isle as though it were an integral part of Europe as opposed to a freebooting island wandering the Atlantic in search of plunder - a sure sign of a book published in 1969.
As I was being stung on the face by a burst of hail it struck me that I particularly like the section on the European mind as for at least a couple of pages on Jansenism helped Pascal to drop into place in my mind. There is a way in which reading is a journey through Lisa's labyrinth or takes Kalliope's spiral as its natural mode of progression and that, I at least, come across things not in a natural order but in a disconnection or repetitive manner that might oblige me more to reconsider, perpetually, than if I had through some other life, happened upon a more ordered plan of reading.
Here I had the curious fact of seeing the dog eared pages and occasional dried jasmine flower that I had previously read this book one summer in the back garden of my parent's first bought house, although I had no specific memories of reading it, a realisation that must qualify any recommendation implicit, explicit or accepted I make of this book.
I liked the idea of the political value of extravagance, and that Colbert's careful involvement of Louis XIV in the financial administration of France through regular reports and meetings may not have convinced the monarch of the knife edged dance of managing the whole mess, but rather assured him of the vast degree of expertise and skill that could be relied upon to finance his art of Kingship.
Fouquet defended himself against Colbert's accusations in part by arguing: The expenses of the state would not have been met, for the most urgent needs & necessities, nor pay given to the troops...if I had not provided them; & I would not have been able to provide them if my wealth, my expenditure, my splendour of life & my liberality, together with the notice taken of my absolute reliability, had not given me credit (p195) , which is in itself a summary of the style of Louis XIV - by living large he demonstrated financial capacity and wooed investors at one and the same time as satisfying his vision of himself. Of course somebody had to pay, but nobody listens to the little people. It all seems a bit contemporary.
December 6, 2022
He de reconocer que últimamente no estoy demasiado concentrado y creo que eso me ha pasado factura a la hora de leer este libro; ha hecho que me dure mucho más de lo previsto y ha hecho que se me haga farragoso y algo pesado por momentos.
Pese a lo dicho, me parce que es un texto que no está a la altura de sus homólogos anteriores a cargo de Elton, Elliot o Parker. Sin embargo, sigue siendo una lectura esclarecedora y adecuada para conocer un periodo histórico que en España no se trata adecuadamente ya que se identifica con nuestra decadencia como potencia pero que nos marcó como nación.
Pese a lo dicho, me parce que es un texto que no está a la altura de sus homólogos anteriores a cargo de Elton, Elliot o Parker. Sin embargo, sigue siendo una lectura esclarecedora y adecuada para conocer un periodo histórico que en España no se trata adecuadamente ya que se identifica con nuestra decadencia como potencia pero que nos marcó como nación.
June 14, 2025
Interesting political overview (with some cultural asides about theological developments, scientific advances etc) of a significant period about which I knew very little.
Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews