1654 - Political Events

Political Events

The Treaty of Westminster April 6 ends the Anglo-Dutch War that started in 1652. Represented by their councillor pensionary Johan de Witt, the Dutch agree to recognize the English Navigation Act of 1651 and to pay an indemnity. They agree to join England in a defensive league, and Witt agrees secretly to exclude members of the house of Orange from the stadholdership in deference to Oliver Cromwell's anxieties over the marriage of Mary, daughter of England's late Charles I, to Willem III of Orange. Cromwell sends Sussex-born mathematician John Pell, 44, to Switzerland in an effort to persuade Swiss Protestants to join a Continental Protestant league against the English crown.

Sweden's queen Kristina abdicates June 6 after a 22-year reign in which she has sold or mortgaged vast amounts of crown property to support the 17 counts, 46 barons, and 428 lesser nobles that she has created. A critic said of her last year, "There is nothing feminine about her save her sex. Her voice, her manner of speaking, her gait, her mien, and her manners are those of a male," but Axel Oxenstierna, Chancellor of the Regents, has said, "Her Majesty is a credit to her sex and age; God knows, how it rejoices me to see that she is NOT womanly, but of good heart and deep understanding. Despite her sex there is nothing feminine about her. Her voice is that of a man and likewise her manner of speech, her movements and gestures . . . although she rides sidesaddle, she sways and bends her body in such a way that, unless one sees her from close quarters, it is easy to take her for a man." With few exceptions, Kristina has avoided the company of women. Dressed in male attire and traveling under the name Count Dohna, she leaves Stockholm, is received into the Catholic Church at Innsbruck, and rides into Rome on horseback, clad in the costume of an Amazon. Kristina is succeeded by a 32-year-old cousin who will reign until 1660 as Karl X Gustav.

Oliver Cromwell quarrels with Parliament September 3 and 9 days later orders the exclusion of hostile members.

The Ukrainian Cossack Bogdan Chmielnicki swears allegiance to Russia's Aleksis I Mikhailovichin in January and gives up the Ukraine's aspirations to independence (see 1651). Russian troops seize Smolensk, beginning a 13-year war over the Ukraine between Russia and Poland. The war will bring the Russians into contact for the first time with the Ottoman Turks in the Balkans (see Chmielnicki, 1657).

The Ottoman Empire has its fourth Celali (Jelali) Revolt in Anatolia. The uprising will be suppressed next year, and a final such revolt will last only from 1658 to 1659, although Jelalis will continue depredations from time to time in this century and the next as a provincial protest against the power of the Janissaries.

Portugal recovers the Brazilian territory taken by the Dutch in 1635.