Description
Book SynopsisThis book examines early modern politics, diplomacy and finance by looking at the transfer of money and other resources between sovereigns in return for military or political service, often known as the payment of ‘subsidies’. Focusing on payments made by the French crown, the contributors explore how subsidies provided opportunities for princes, statesmen, generals and merchant-bankers to pursue their political goals. By highlighting the ways in which the payment and acceptance of subsidies shaped concepts of honour and reputation, the book shows how material interests and questions of identity coalesced. The construction of states and the political debates within polities are seen to have been influenced by the movement of money and resources across borders. Consequently, the interaction between financial and mercantile hubs and networks was vital to state formation in early modern Europe.
An electronic version of this book is available under a creative commons licence: manchesteropenhive.com/view/9789198469844/9789198469844.xml
Table of ContentsIntroduction – Svante Norrhem and Erik Thomson
1 The role of subsidies in seventeenth-century French foreign relations and their European context – Anuschka Tischer
2 ‘Unter den Schutz Frankreichs’: German reception of French subsidies in the Thirty Years’ War – Tryntje Helfferich
3 ‘Mercenary’ contracts as Fiscal-Military Instruments – Peter H. Wilson
4 The uses of French subsidies in Sweden, 1632–1729 – Svante Norrhem
5 The problems with receiving subsidies: Sweden and the lesser powers in the long eighteenth century – Erik Bodensten
6 Pensions in Switzerland: practices, conflicts, and impact in the sixteenth century – Philippe Rogger
7 Subsidy treaties in early modern times: the example of the German principality of Waldeck – Andreas Flurschütz da Cruz
8 Small powers and great designs: diplomacy, cross-border patronage and the negotiation of subsidy alliances in the northwestern part of the Holy Roman Empire (late seventeenth century) – Tilman Haug
9 The ‘fiscal-military hub’ of Amsterdam: intermediating the French subsidies to Sweden during the Thirty Years’ War – Marianne Klerk
10 Jean Hoeufft, French subsidies, and the Thirty Years’ War – Erik Thomson
Index
