ABSTRACT
The important changes that took place in 17th-century Europe were partly due to previous events and trends, and partly due to a series of dramatic and unexpected events. These include the start of a “little ice age”, the most virulent and widespread plague epidemics since the Middle Ages, the Thirty Years’ War, religious and tax revolts, political revolutions, nobles in revolt against sovereigns, separatist movements and civil wars. The political and military crisis linked to the early modern age’s most devastating conflict, the Thirty Years’ War, played a decisive role in Europe. The chapter focuses on Europe, using demographic data and existent research to explain the origins of the crisis as lying mainly in the events of the first half of the century. From the 1660s to the 1670s onwards, although prices were generally depressed, it seems more appropriate to talk of reorganisation of the continent’s economic and political structures.
