Editing Holy Roman Empire (section)

=== Baroque period ===
{{Main|Germany in the early modern period|Pomerania during the Early Modern Age}}
{{Further|Baroque|Protestant Union|Catholic League (German)|Thirty Years' War}}
[[File:Giuseppe Arcimboldi 003.jpg|upright=1|thumb|[[Maximilian II, Holy Roman Emperor|Emperor Maximilian II]] with his family]]
[[File:HolyRomanEmpire 1618.png|thumb|upright=1.15|Religion in the Holy Roman Empire on the eve of the [[Thirty Years' War]]]]
[[File:HRR 1648.png|thumb|upright=1.15|The Empire after the [[Peace of Westphalia]], 1648]]

Germany would enjoy relative peace for the next six decades. On the eastern front, the Turks continued to loom large as a threat, although war would mean further compromises with the Protestant princes, and so the Emperor sought to avoid it. In the west, the Rhineland increasingly fell under French influence. After the Dutch revolt against Spain erupted, the Empire remained neutral, {{lang|la|de facto}} allowing the Netherlands to depart the empire in 1581. A side effect was the [[Cologne War]], which ravaged much of the upper Rhine. Emperor [[Ferdinand III, Holy Roman Emperor|Ferdinand III]] formally accepted Dutch neutrality in 1653, a decision ratified by the Reichstag in 1728.

After Ferdinand died in 1564, his son [[Maximilian II, Holy Roman Emperor|Maximilian II]] became Emperor, and like his father accepted the existence of Protestantism and the need for occasional compromise with it. Maximilian was succeeded in 1576 by [[Rudolf II, Holy Roman Emperor|Rudolf II]], who preferred [[Ancient Greek philosophy|classical Greek philosophy]] to Christianity and lived an isolated existence in Bohemia. He became afraid to act when the Catholic Church was forcibly reasserting control in Austria and Hungary, and the Protestant princes became upset over this.

Imperial power sharply deteriorated by the time of Rudolf's death in 1612. When Bohemians rebelled against the Emperor, the immediate result was the series of conflicts known as the [[Thirty Years' War]] (1618–1648), which devastated the empire. Foreign powers, including France and Sweden, intervened in the conflict and strengthened those fighting the Imperial power, but also seized considerable territory for themselves. Accordingly, the empire could never return to its former glory, leading [[Voltaire]] to make his infamous quip that the Holy Roman Empire was "neither Holy nor Roman nor an Empire."<ref>{{Cite journal|last=Renna|first=Thomas|date=September 2015|title=The Holy Roman Empire was Neither Holy, Nor Roman, Nor an Empire|url=https://meridian.allenpress.com/michigan-academician/article-abstract/42/1/60/176868/The-Holy-Roman-Empire-was-Neither-Holy-Nor-Roman?redirectedFrom=fulltext|journal=Michigan Academician|volume=42|issue=1|pages=60–75|doi=10.7245/0026-2005-42.1.60|issn=0026-2005|access-date=31 March 2023}}</ref>

Still, its actual end did not come for two centuries. The [[Peace of Westphalia]] in 1648, which ended the Thirty Years' War allowed [[Calvinism]], but [[Anabaptists]], [[Arminians]] and other Protestant communities would still lack any support and continue to be persecuted well until the end of the empire. The Habsburg emperors focused on consolidating their own estates in Austria and elsewhere.

At the [[Battle of Vienna]] (1683), the [[Army of the Holy Roman Empire]], led by the Polish King [[John III Sobieski]], decisively defeated a large Turkish army, stopping the western Ottoman advance and leading to the eventual dismemberment of the [[Ottoman Empire]] in Europe. The army was one third forces of the [[Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth]] and two thirds forces of the Holy Roman Empire.