18 Facts About Cologne War

Cologne War was a conflict between Protestant and Catholic factions that devastated the Electorate of Cologne, a historical ecclesiastical principality of the Holy Roman Empire, within present-day North Rhine-Westphalia, in Germany.

Cologne War concluded with victory of the Catholic archbishop Ernst, who expelled the Protestant archbishop Gebhard from the Electorate.

Cologne War ordered a general Diet in Augsburg at which the various states would discuss the religious problem and its solution.

Cologne War himself did not attend, and delegated authority to his brother, Ferdinand, to "act and settle" disputes of territory, religion, and local power.

Electorate obtained its name from the city, and Cologne War had served as the capital of the archbishopric until 1288.

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Cologne War was descended from the Jacobin line of the House of Waldburg; his uncle was a cardinal, and his family had significant imperial contacts.

Cologne War had the support of the neighboring Duke of Julich and several allies within the Cathedral Chapter.

Cologne War was a career cleric, not necessarily qualified to be an archbishop on the basis of his theological erudition, but by his family connections.

Cologne War had been educated by Jesuits and the papacy considered collaboration with his family as a means to limit the spread of Lutheranism and Calvinism in the northern provinces.

Cologne War's had been raised in Eisleben, the town in which Martin Luther had been born.

The magistrates of Cologne War vehemently opposed any possible conversion and the extension of parity to Protestants in the archdiocese.

Cologne War's conversion had widespread implications for the future of the Holy Roman Empire's electoral process established by the Golden Bull of 1356.

The difficulties of such a conversion had been faced before: Hermann von Wied, a previous prince-elector and archbishop in Cologne War, had converted to Protestantism, but had resigned from his office.

In 1581, Philip's forces, paid for by papal gold, had taken Aachen, which Protestants had seized; by the mid–1580s, the Duke of Parma's forces, encouraged by the Wittelsbachs and the Catholics in Cologne War, had secured garrisons throughout the northern territories of the Electorate.

Cologne War was a skilled and charismatic soldier, and his men would do anything for him; reportedly, he could sleep in his saddle, and seemed indomitable in the field.

The Cologne War, similar to the Dutch Revolt in that respect, was a war of sieges, not of assembled armies facing one another on the field of battle, nor of maneuver, feint, and parry that characterized wars two centuries earlier and later.

Cologne War had exhausted his diplomatic, financial, and military possibilities.

Ernst's victory, both in winning the election in 1583, and in convincing the assembly of other electors to accept him in 1585, confirmed him as the new archbishop of Cologne War and gave the Wittelsbach family a foothold on the northern Rhine.