Includes bibliographical references and index.

The Thirty Years War : an introduction / Olaf Asbach and Peter Schröder -- Imperial politics, 1555-1618 / Joachim Whaley -- The Palatinate and its networks in the empire and in Europe / Brennan Pursell -- The emperor / Christoph Kampmann -- The Spanish monarchy and the challenges of the Thirty Years War / Gabriel Guarino -- Denmark / Paul Douglas Lockhart -- Sweden / Pärtel Piirimäe -- France and the Thirty Years War / Lucien Bély -- The Papacy / Guido Braun -- Non-splendid isolation : the Ottoman Empire and the Thirty Years War / Maria Baramova -- 1618-1629 / Ronald G. Aschy -- 1629-1635 / Toby Osborne -- The Long War (1635-1648) / Tryntje Helfferich -- The Dutch-Spanish War in the Low-Countries 1621-1648 / Olaf van Nimwegen -- The Thirty Years War in Italy 1628-1659 / Sven Externbrink -- The Peace of 1555 : "a failed settlement" / Matthias Pohlig -- The Edict of restitution (1629) and the failure of Catholic restoration / Marc Forster -- Lutherans, Calvinists and the road to a normative year / Ralf-Peter Fuchs -- The Thirty Years War : "a religious war" : religion and Machiavellism at the turning point of 1635 / Cornel Zwierlein -- The material conditions of war / John Theibault -- The experience of war / Sigrun Haude -- Strategy and the conduct of war / Peter Wilson -- The Peace of Prague : "a failed settlement" / Martin Espenhorst -- The settlement of 1648 for the German empire / Axel Gotthard -- The Peace of Westphalia : a European peace / Heinz Duchhardt -- A peace for the whole world? : perceptions and effects of the peace treaty of Münster (1648) on the world outside Europe / Susan Richter.