Borderlands and fatherlands: 'Foreign' soldiery in the Holy Roman Empire 1576-1618

This thesis analyses the use and abuse of ‘foreign’ soldiers in the political rhetoric of the Lower-Rhine-Westphalian Circle between 1576 and 1618, exploring what the categorisations applied to such men can tell us about warfare and identity in the Holy Roman Empire and beyond. It argues that the Imperial approach was characterised by nuance, flexibility, and constructive ambiguity, which allowed the region to avoid being drawn deeper into conflicts to which there was no military solution. A key reason for its success was that – despite a profusion of patriotic language denouncing foreign thre... Mehr ...