Having faced destruction during the Siege of Vienna (1683), the Habsburg monarchy of Austria bounced back to secure Hungary and Transylvania from the Ottomans by the Treaty of Karlowitz (1699). Further wars with the Ottomans produced more mixed results: the Banat of Temesvar was annexed in 1718, and (mostly) retained,... More
The Hallstatt Culture dominated central and western Europe between 800–500 BCE. It was named after numerous artefacts and burials were discovered in 1846 in an old salt mine in Hallstatt, modern Austria. This proto- Celtic culture has been divided by archaeologists into four periods: A–D. Periods A–B are early Hallstatt... More
Liu Bang, who became the first Han emperor in 202 BCE, seized power in a rebellion against the Qin dynasty. Determined to avoid the fate of his predecessors, he imposed a centralized system of rule. Under the Han, the emperor was supreme, with an inner council of three ‘ducal ministers’.... More
The Han Dynasty, with a brief interregnum, lasted for over 400 years, and its longevity derived from a solid system of administrative control. The standard unit of local government was the commandery, each headed by an administrator reporting in to a provincial governor or inspector. Interwoven with the commanderies were... More
The members of the Hanseatic League were all independent ‘free cities’ owing direct allegiance to the Holy Roman Emperor. In 1361–70, they were powerful enough to go to war with Denmark, and win, enforcing their monopoly of Danish trade and confirming it through a further war (1428–35). At their height,... More
In 1798 the armies of the French republic overran Switzerland, seeking to promulgate their revolutionary ideas and to liberate the Swiss from a system of government that they perceived as feudal. In 1799 French troops marched into Fricktal, proclaiming it a new independent canton. The Swiss, especially in the more... More
In the winter of 1916–17 the German General, von Hindenburg, would lend his name to a battery of defensive fortifications which, by eliminating the salient south of Arras, reduced the German front line by 30 miles (50 km). This, the Hindenburg Line, released some ten divisions from defensive duties. Between... More
The Hittites were perhaps the most spectacular casualties of the Bronze Age collapse, which swept away the major powers of the Near East in the 12th century BCE. Its triggers are disputed, but this seems to have been a time of widespread population displacement, including the marauding, mysterious ‘Sea People’.... More
The Hittites first came to prominence in the 17th century BCE, and managed to master the forging of iron, which gave them combat edge in the durability of their weaponry over Bronze Age rivals. In an early imperial phase, they reached, and sacked, Babylon (1531 BCE) but then lapsed into... More
The Hittites, an ancient Anatolian tribe, were near their nadir in 1400 BCE; after the death of Telipinu I around a century before their territories had steadily retrenched. To the south, the Egyptian Empire was at its zenith under the 18th Dynasty, but the Hittites were too parochial for this... More
The English Reformation was essentially a political confection, driven by Henry VIII, without the powerful grass-roots element of its German predecessors. The Black Death had already devastated many monastic communities and many thenceforth fell into decline, but this process was mitigated by the rise of mendicant orders. There is limited... More
In 1095 Pope Urban II called upon Western Christendom to liberate Jerusalem and eastern Byzantium from Muslim encroachment. They feared the Seljuk Turks (Sunni Muslims) on their borders and wished to reclaim lands taken by them. Urban also had a personal motive for his appeal, he wanted to centralize divided... More