Assuming Napoleon Bonaparte never came into power in a alternate timeline, how could the Holy Roman Empire fall?
Prussia tries to assert leadership and the catholic German states decides to follow Austria instead.Assuming Napoleon Bonaparte never came into power in a alternate timeline, how could the Holy Roman Empire fall?
Assuming Napoleon Bonaparte never came into power in a alternate timeline, how could the Holy Roman Empire fall?
Holy Roman Empire survives to early 20th century but is toppled by communist revolution.
Assuming french revolution happened,nearly every empire was impacted by its ideas.With prussia trying to lead the germanic states,it could have divided a wedge between the ruler and his people by these ideas,something akin to what germany did with lenin and russia in ww1.The only catalyst needed,a few military defeats of the holy roman empire which was not difficult to achieve.Assuming Napoleon Bonaparte never came into power in a alternate timeline, how could the Holy Roman Empire fall?
It was never a centralised authority, and was already in severe decline after the 30 Years War. If Napoleon didn't come into power, I am assuming another continental war would make it untenable for a supranational organisation with very little power to exist.
Was the German Confederation much different in that respect?
That's why Austria was booted.
Is the French revolution averted or just Napoleon?
With a French revolution and no Napoleon, you still get the French revolutionary government expanding to the Rhine and the rise of nationalism. You still have the "Springtime of Nations" at some point. Probably also the French move into Italy in a big way at some point. Napoleon wasn't needed for the revolution or even its miltiary success.
It was already virtually dead. But it would fully die after a bunch of states leave it, or if Austria is the one uniting Germany, when Germany is unified.
Assuming Napoleon Bonaparte never came into power in a alternate timeline, how could the Holy Roman Empire fall?
The Congress agreed to much of this under French pressure; then Austria and Russia restarted the war, only to be defeated again, again with Napoleon taking a leading role, now as First Consul. Napoleon had gone to Egypt in the meantime; suppose he caught something and died there. IMO, after Campo Formio, it's still too late to save the HRE. The idea of secularizing the ecclesiastical states had been spreading for decades; Emperors Charles VII and Joseph II had both secretly proposed major secularizations as early as the 1740s. The shock of the French Revolution broke the traditionalist consensus that had blocked these projects. The French victories made the process seem inevitable.
OTL, the final settlement was largely dictated by France (and by Russia, whose Tsar favored his German relatives and in-laws). The princes, even those who had been opposed to the whole process, now competed frantically for the favor of the French arbiters to get as Bavariaa got thland as possible.
Didn't the Prussians have some claims around Würzburg? We probably should look over Ferdinand III of Tuscany, as they shuffled him between Tuscany, Salzburg, and Würzburg. Check him out and we find the various treaties about changing territory. Looking it up, it seems that he was supported by the French and had neutrality early on, but that Reoublics froze him out and he went to Austria. Then the French later used Tuscany (which, we should remember, was originally two republics a Doge made into a duchy, using a town hall as his palace) to make the Kingdom of Etruria (really wish I remembered name of the Cambridge book series on history I once found, with its wonderful atlas as a seperate book) which went to the Duke of Parma whose lands went to French, while... Yah, there was soooo much changing of lands.Of course, it might be a different kind of secularisation.
Frex, OTL Bavaria received the Prince-Bishopric of Wurzburg in compensation for Tyrol and other acquisitions which it had to give back to Austria. But w/o Napoleon, it almost certainly never acquired those Austrian lands in the first place, so has nothing in particular to be compensated for. So does Wurzburg get annexed by another state, or just get turned into a duchy, as Salzburg was for a time? After all, it is bigger than many of the existing secular principalities. And if so who gets it?
Probably in a TTL equivalent of the Seven Weeks War.Assuming Napoleon Bonaparte never came into power in a alternate timeline, how could the Holy Roman Empire fall?
Of course, it might be a different kind of secularisation.
Frex, OTL Bavaria received the Prince-Bishopric of Wurzburg in compensation for Tyrol and other acquisitions which it had to give back to Austria.
That was in 1815. The Bishopric was secularized and awarded to Bavaria in 1803. In 1805, it was awarded to Ferdinand III of Tuscany, in compensation for Salzburg, which he had earlier received after losing Tuscany and now went to Austria, while Bavaria got Tyrol. In 1815, Ferdinand was restored to Tuscany, Tyrol was restored to Austria, and Bavaria was again given Wurzburg, this time for good.