History Thirty Years War

It has been famously pointed out that the Holy Roman Empire was neither holy, nor Roman, but it was also not an empire in the sense people expect when hearing the term. In theory, the emperor was the highest prince in Christendom, and his dominion extended the length and breadth of Western Europe. The empire had been created by the papacy in 801 when Pope Leo III famously crowned the supposedly unwitting Charlemagne in Saint Peter’s Basilica, intending to recreate the Western Roman Empire.

Herbert Rosendorfer erzählt eines der dunkelsten Kapitel der deutschen Geschichte. Er zeigt, wie eine religiöse Auseinandersetzung zu einem europäischen Machtkampf wird, wie religiöser Fanatismus letztlich Verheerung und Verwüstung über ganz Europa bringt und dass Kriege, wenn man es genau betrachtet, von beiden Seiten verloren werden.