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Title: The French Religious Wars, 1562-1598 by Robert J. Knecht ISBN: 1-84176-395-0 Publisher: Osprey Pub Co Pub. Date: October, 2002 Format: Paperback List Price(USD): $14.95 |
Average Customer Rating: 4.67 (3 reviews)
Rating: 4
Summary: Facinating Insight Into A Strange Conflict
Comment: This book provides fascinating insight into a French civil war sparked by religious intolerance and fueled by paranoia, treachery, and desire for personal gain. The author breaks this era into 8 separate periods of warfare and describes why fighting erupted and why treaties were signed. The book does provide some detail on army organization and battle field maps of key engagements. As with all Osprey books, it is well illustrated. A very nice summary to a fascinating conflict during a time when armies were largely made up of pike, musket, and armored cavalry.
Rating: 5
Summary: Shouldn't it be the French Civil War?
Comment: First of all, this most recent addition to Osprey's most recent military history series is a must have! What the author of this book has done is truly amazing! Knecht has managed to write a detailed account of a little-known conflict while keeping it simple and understandable!
What has been dubbed "The French Religious Wars" was more like a civil war, with all the ferocity and ruthlessness to qualify the conflict as one.
The wars were waged by two sides, both French: The so-called "Huguenots", generally French protestants, and Catholic France, headed by a diminishing monarchy. Despite several attempts at peace treaties and so on, tempers always flare up time and again, until the last wars in the period of 1585-1598 where old scores between the two participant sides were finally settled.
Accompanying the excellent narration on the causes, forces, and battles of the conflict are several drawings, paintings, and maps, all enabling the reader to visualize the full nightmare of this certain "religious wars." Overall an excellent researched work which is bound to satisfy any reader who has the good luck to find this book. Truly excellent.
Rating: 5
Summary: One of the Best of the Essential History Series
Comment: Finally, Osprey is beginning to break new ground with its Essential History series. Professor Robert J. Knecht, an English scholar on French 16th Century history from the University of Birmingham, is the author of the latest volume in the series - The French Religious Wars 1562-1598. Knecht's book is well written and covers a much-neglected subject with considerable skill and insight.
The French Religious Wars 1562-1598 begins with sections on the background to the conflict, which cover the related threads of religious and aristocratic dissent in mid-16th Century France. Initially, Professor Knecht shows that the French King - a staunch defender of the Catholic faith in the realm - was able to deal with the early spread of the Lutheran faith into France, but failed to inhibit the more virulent Calvinist strain. Indeed, the infiltration into France of Calvinist missionaries from Geneva resembled communist tactics in the 1920s and 1930s. By 1560, some of the French nobility had been converted and Protestants in France - dubbed "Huguenots" - had become a significant problem to the stability of the realm, although Knecht notes that they were only about 10% of the total population. Faced with this growing threat, the French monarchy adopted a policy of religious persecution, which inevitably led to violent clashes. It is also clear from Knecht's account that both sides used violence and wanton destruction to intimidate their opponents. Efforts at compromise failed and both sides gradually became committed to the conversion or elimination of the other. However, non-religious factors also influenced the outbreak of civil war in France, particularly the relationship between a relatively weak and cash-starved monarchy and opportunistic nobility. Indeed, one interesting characteristic of these wars was the propensity of major players to switch faith and loyalties as the tides of war shifted.
Professor Knecht provides interesting detail on the military aspects of the wars as well. Although numerically strong, the French Royal Army comprised 70% foreign mercenaries. Paying the troops was thus a chronic problem and there was never enough cash to sustain armies for more than one year at a time, which induced a spasmodic quality into the conduct of campaigns. Both armies were also trained and equipped in essentially the same manner, as often happens in civil wars. Foreign military interventions occurred from time to time in support of both sides, but were never decisive. Professor Knecht's campaign narrative is 41 pages long and quite good. The detail on the Battle of Dreux in 1562 - where oddly the commanders of both sides were captured - is particularly interesting. Knecht's narrative also reveals the complex web of diplomatic, political and social factors which intertwined with the strictly military operations. The French Religious Wars were a complex historical phenomenon, but Professor Knecht succeeds in producing a remarkably coherent account of these conflicts.
Maps in this volume include: a strategic map of battles and sieges, wars from 1572-1585, the battles of Dreux, St Denis, Coutras, Arques, Ivry, Huguenot security towns, Coligny's march and foreign aid, and the last wars in 1585-1598. The illustrations in this volume are also quite good. The author's bibliography is extensive and indicates real research, as well as providing a useful starting point for further reading. The "portrait of a soldier" section is much better than usual in these volumes, particularly the portrait of the brutal French Marshal Blaise de Monluc, who believed that, "cruelty was essential to the effective conduct of war."
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Title: The Thirty Years' War 1618-1648 by Richard Bonney ISBN: 1841763780 Publisher: Osprey Pub Co Pub. Date: September, 2002 List Price(USD): $14.95 |
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Title: The French Wars 1667-1714 by John A. Lynn ISBN: 1841763616 Publisher: Osprey Pub Co Pub. Date: October, 2002 List Price(USD): $14.95 |
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Title: The Hundred Years' War by Anne. Dr Curry ISBN: 1841762695 Publisher: Osprey Pub Co Pub. Date: October, 2002 List Price(USD): $14.95 |
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Title: The Seven Years' War (Essential Histories, No 6) by Daniel Marston ISBN: 1841761915 Publisher: Osprey Pub Co Pub. Date: July, 2001 List Price(USD): $14.95 |
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Title: The Franco-Prussian War 1870-1871 (Essential Histories) by Stephen Badsey ISBN: 1841764213 Publisher: Osprey Pub Co Pub. Date: March, 2003 List Price(USD): $14.95 |
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