European History

In addition to the answers included by the other Educators, I will mention that King Ferdinand and Queen Isabella of Spain hoped to find a route to the Spice Islands that did not directly compete...

Spain was considered to have as three main goals behind its expeditions to North America: the expansion of its empire, the attainment of wealth, and the spread of Christianity. It is easily...

Nicholas Copernicus (1473-1543) overturned the long-established Ptolemaic system. Ptolemy, an ancient Greco-Egyptian astrologer, put the earth at the center of the universe. The Copernican system...

The slogan “Liberté, Egalité, Fraternité,” or “Liberty, Equality, Fraternity, or Death,” has been adopted as the French national motto, but it was originally promulgated as the French Revolution...

Columbus's pride is very much on display in the fourth of his letters to Ferdinand and Isabella. Columbus devotes a lot of time in the letter to complaining about the lack of recognition of what he...

The defeat of the Byzantine Empire by the Muslim Ottoman Empire was a great blow to European trade with Asia. The Byzantines, who had been friendly towards European traders and charged reasonable...

The difference between the Elizabethan Age and Renaissance is that while the Renaissance era is considered to be the transition from the middle Ages to modern history in Europe, the Elizabethan Age...

The aftermath of World War I caused a plethora of economic and social problems for the defeated countries. The fascists were able to seize power because they claimed they could fix these issues....

The Great Schism can refer to two separate events. The first is the East-West Schism of 1054. The second is the Western Schism of 1378-1417. The effects of the Great Schism of 1054 had a profound...

The Age of Exploration relied on the creation or improvement of many forms of technology. Cartography, or the making of maps, became more accurate during this time period, which guided navigators...

Napoleon dominated Europe from about 1800 to 1815. He was the dictator of France and conqueror of much of Europe. His years in power marked the second part of the French Revolution, which began in...

During World War II (1939–1945) Great Britain had a constitutional monarchy. Just as it is today, the government was headed by the prime minister, who was appointed under the auspices of the ruling...

The increase in trade helped enlarge towns and cities in Europe because it gave the towns and cities an economic base upon which to grow. When there was very little trade in Europe, there was very...

There were many inequalities that contributed to the French Revolution. In France, there were three groups or estates of people. The first group was the clergy, the second estate was made up of...

It is difficult to suggest that there was any one cause of the French Revolution. The purpose, however, was clear: overthrow of the monarchy. The gradual growth of a revolutionary movement was the...

The Great Schism, or the schism between the Roman Catholic Church and the Eastern Orthodox Church, is a complex issue that started well before the mutual ex-communications in 1054 CE. Before we get...

Here are the steps the Communists took to turn Russia in to a centralized state ruled by a single party: 1903: There is a meeting of the Russian Social-Democratic Labor Party (RSDLP). During this...

Toward the end of the Middle Ages, the Catholic Church was rife with corruption. The church was split by the Great Schism (From 1378-1417 there were three simultaneous popes, each claiming to be...

An early advocate of fundamental changes in the way children are taught, John Amos Comenius (originally, Jan Amos Komensky, in his native Czech) had a major impact on the manner in which students...

Unlike other Spanish explorers and conquistadors, Vasco Nunez de Balboa was not the leader of an expedition and was not financed by royalty when he first went to the New World. Instead, he joined...

The name of Maximilien Robespierre has come to be associated with the most violent phase of the French Revolution, The Reign of Terror. It is this particular phase that tends to epitomize the...

In the thousand years after the fall of Rome, Eastern and Western Europe went down two different paths. Despite their differences, they still retained a number of similarities. Let's look at some...

It's fair to say that Marie Antoinette's accomplishments don't exactly leap out of the pages of the history books. Although it's unlikely that she did actually say "Let them eat cake" about the...

Generally speaking, Louis XVI was uninterested in foreign policy. But as king of France, he was expected to take a close interest in the country’s relations with the rest of the world. Even after...

The modern age burst into full flower during the late 17th and 18th century period known as the Enlightenment, but the seeds were planted during the Renaissance. The term Renaissance or rebirth...

Whatever their original motives, the Crusades gave Westerners a taste for foreign goods. Items unavailable at home such as fine silks, spices, and precious metals were eagerly snapped up by the...

In order to examine any of Napoleon’s specific foreign policy initiatives, one must first understand his overarching political goal, which was to control the entire European continent. All of...

The name "France" derives from the invasion and conquest of Roman Gaul by Germanic tribes known as the Franks. By 486 A.D., these tribes united under a monarchy that replaced the Roman...

Two factors facilitated Spain's rise to power in the sixteenth century. The first was the consolidation of the largest two Spanish kingdoms under Ferdinand of Aragon and Isabella of Castile in 1492...

The Edict of Milan was a mandate authorized in 313 A.D. by the Roman emperors Constantine and Licinius declaring the practice of Christianity legal in the Roman empire. The full text of this edict...

During the Chanak Crisis, also called the Chanak Incident, Turkish forces threatened British rule at Chanak, a seaport on the Dardanelles Strait in 1922. Britain, France, and Greece had occupied...

The man known as Charlemagne, or Charles the Great, was born in 742. In 768, he became king of the Franks upon the death of his father Pepin the Short, although he co-ruled with his brother...

On the whole, one would have to say no. That's not to say that the famous rubric was a complete sham. A corrupt, bankrupt system was replaced by one in which there was far greater participation by...

First, European nations developed or acquired, earlier than other peoples around the world, many of the technologies necessary for colonization. These included nautical innovations like the caravel...

The Enlightenment led to rational ideas about government. Kings no longer ruled by divine right; rather, government was to be rational. For some people, this meant a rise in republican...

The invention of the printing press by Johannes Gutenberg helped bring about the period of mass communication. Revolutionary ideas were spread much faster, and people were getting more enlightened,...

Here is the first similarity: massive loss of life, especially in the ruling class. King Louis XVI and his wife Marie Antoinette both were beheaded and Czar Nicholas II and his family were shot...

Voltaire had several valid points when he made this statement. The Holy Roman Empire was not the center of the Church; rather, that was the Vatican, which was the Pope's city. Most of what would be...

European countries engaged in imperialism for various reasons. One of the reasons for doing so was to fulfill economic needs. The Industrial Revolution led to advancements in science and...

The Roman Empire lasted for some five hundred years—or one thousand if one includes the Eastern Roman or Byzantine Empire. This means that it changed radically over the period during which it...

The early part of Louis' personal reign (after the death of Mazarin in 1661) was marked by several controversial changes to the government and council. The period was highly successful in terms of...

Throughout his reign, King Louis XIV sought to strengthen the power of the French monarchy. He was an ardent proponent of the divine right of kings. This was the idea that monarchs received their...

As with most great artists from over the millennium, Michelangelo di Lodovico Buonarroti Simoni, known simply as Michelangelo, is remembered for his most famous works of art, especially for his...

There were a few factors that led to Columbus' exploration. The Portuguese were the first to find a new trade route to India when Vasco da Gama successfully navigated around the Cape of Good Hope....

The Third Estate was made up of the common people of France in the years leading up to the French Revolution. They chose the name "Third Estate" to define themselves in contrast to the First and...

Hitler was able to conquer so much of Europe in a short period of time because the rest of Europe was unprepared. The rest of Europe spent a smaller percentage of their money on the military...