The Last Valley (novel)
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The Last Valley (novel)
''The Last Valley'' (1959), by J. B. Pick, is an historical novel about the Thirty Years' War (1618–1648). The story occurs from September 1637 to March 1638, and centres on two men – a mercenary soldier and an intellectual – who are fleeing the destruction and starvation wrought by religious war. In southern Germany, each man stumbles upon a fertile valley untouched by the war. Soldier and intellectual, man of arms and man of mind, must collaborate to preserve the peace and plenty of the last valley from the stress and strain of the religious bigotry that caused thirty years of war in Europe. In Britain, the novel originally was published as ''The Fat Valley''. James Clavell adapted and directed the novel as '' The Last Valley'' (1970), with Michael Caine and Omar Sharif, respectively the mercenary captain and the philosopher. Plot summary The story opens with a man named Vogel, starving and exhausted, running from a burnt-out, plague-ridden village. After several day ...
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WikiProject Novels
A WikiProject, or Wikiproject, is a Wikimedia movement affinity group for contributors with shared goals. WikiProjects are prevalent within the largest wiki, Wikipedia, and exist to varying degrees within sister projects such as Wiktionary, Wikiquote, Wikidata, and Wikisource. They also exist in different languages, and translation of articles is a form of their collaboration. During the COVID-19 pandemic, CBS News noted the role of Wikipedia's WikiProject Medicine in maintaining the accuracy of articles related to the disease. Another WikiProject that has drawn attention is WikiProject Women Scientists, which was profiled by '' Smithsonian'' for its efforts to improve coverage of women scientists which the profile noted had "helped increase the number of female scientists on Wikipedia from around 1,600 to over 5,000". On Wikipedia Some Wikipedia WikiProjects are substantial enough to engage in cooperative activities with outside organizations relevant to the field at issue. F ...
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Johann Von Werth
Johann von Werth (1591 – 16 January 1652), also ''Jan von Werth'' or in French ''Jean de Werth'', was a German general of cavalry in the Thirty Years' War. Biography Werth was born in 1591 most likely at Büttgen in the Duchy of Jülich as the eldest son of the farmer Johann von Wierdt († 1606) and Elisabeth Streithoven. He had seven brothers and sisters. His exact birthplace is not sure, other candidates are Puffendorf (today part of Baesweiler) and Linnich. In the past, historians also argued for Weert in Limburg because they confused him with Jan van der Croon, another imperial general with similar vita. Around 1610, he left home to become a soldier of fortune in the Walloon cavalry under Ambrogio Spinola in the Spanish Netherlands. Most likely, he fought in the War of the Jülich Succession and served afterwards in the garrison of Lingen. The outbreak of the Thirty Years' War saw him moving to Bohemia in support of Holy Roman Emperor Ferdinand II. In the spa ...
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Albrecht Wenzel Eusebius Von Wallenstein
Albrecht Wenzel Eusebius von Wallenstein () (24 September 1583 – 25 February 1634), also von Waldstein ( cs, Albrecht Václav Eusebius z Valdštejna), was a Bohemian military leader and statesman who fought on the Catholic side during the Thirty Years' War (1618–1648). His successful martial career made him one of the richest and most influential men in the Holy Roman Empire by the time of his death. Wallenstein became the supreme commander of the armies of the Imperial Army of Holy Roman Emperor Ferdinand II and was a major figure of the Thirty Years' War. Wallenstein was born in the Kingdom of Bohemia into a poor Protestant noble family. He acquired a multilingual university education across Europe and converted to Catholicism in 1606. A marriage in 1609 to the wealthy widow of a Bohemian landowner gave him access to considerable estates and wealth after her death at an early age in 1614. Three years later, Wallenstein embarked on a career as a mercenary by raisin ...
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Hans Georg Von Arnim-Boitzenburg
Johann or Hans Georg von Arnim-Boitzenburg (1583 in Boitzenburger Land – 28 April 1641, in Dresden) was a German Field Marshal. At different times during the Thirty Years' War, he was a Field Marshal for the Holy Roman Empire and its opponent the Electorate of Saxony. He also pursued various diplomatic tasks. Biography Arnim was born in Boitzenburger Land, Brandenburg. After studies at Frankfurt (Oder), Leipzig, and Rostock, he entered into service at the Prussian court at Königsberg in 1612, a post he had to leave the next year because of a duel. He aided the Swedish army under Gustavus Adolphus against Russia from 1613 to 1617. During a number of years he was sent on secret mission between Gustav Adolph of Sweden and the Elector of Brandenburg to arrange the marriage to Maria Eleonora of Brandenburg, then 1621–22 with his German regiment aided the king of Poland-Lithuania in action against the Ottoman Empire. In 1626, although a Protestant, he was persuaded by W ...
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Johann Tserclaes, Count Of Tilly
Johann Tserclaes, Count of Tilly ( nl, Johan t'Serclaes Graaf van Tilly; german: Johann t'Serclaes Graf von Tilly; french: Jean t'Serclaes de Tilly ; February 1559 – 30 April 1632) was a field marshal who commanded the Catholic League's forces in the Thirty Years' War. From 1620–31, he had an unmatched and demoralizing string of important victories against the Protestants, including White Mountain, Wimpfen, Höchst, Stadtlohn and the Conquest of the Palatinate. He destroyed a Danish army at Lutter and sacked the Protestant city of Magdeburg, which caused the death of some 20,000 of the city's inhabitants, both defenders and non-combatants, out of a total population of 25,000. Tilly was then crushed at Breitenfeld in 1631 by the Swedish army of King Gustavus Adolphus. A Swedish arquebus bullet wounded him severely at the Battle of Rain, and he died two weeks later in Ingolstadt. Along with Duke Albrecht von Wallenstein of Friedland and Mecklenburg, he was on ...
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Sack Of Magdeburg
The Sack of Magdeburg, also called Magdeburg's Wedding (german: Magdeburger Hochzeit) or Magdeburg's Sacrifice (), was the destruction of the Protestantism, Protestant city of Magdeburg on 20 May 1631 by the Imperial Army (Holy Roman Empire), Imperial Army and the forces of the Catholic League (German), Catholic League, resulting in the deaths of around 20,000, including both defenders and non-combatants. The event is considered the worst massacre of the Thirty Years' War. Magdeburg, then one of the largest cities in Germany, having well over 25,000 inhabitants in 1630, did not recover its importance until well into the 18th century. Background Archbishopric of Magdeburg The archbishopric of Magdeburg was established as an ecclesiastical principality in 968. In political respect the Stift#Stift as territory of statehood, Erzstift, the archiepiscopal and capitular temporalities, had gained imperial immediacy as prince-archbishopric in 1180. This meant that the archbishop of Ma ...
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Gottfried Heinrich Graf Zu Pappenheim
Gottfried Heinrich Graf zu Pappenheim (29 May 1594 – 17 November 1632) was a field marshal of the Holy Roman Empire in the Thirty Years' War. A supporter of the Catholic League, he was mortally wounded during the Battle of Lützen fighting the Protestant forces under Swedish king Gustavus Adolphus. Biography Pappenheim was born in the little town of Treuchtlingen, a secondary seat of his family, the ruling Lords of Pappenheim on the Altmühl in Bavaria, a free lordship of the empire ''(see: Pappenheim (state))'', from which the ancient family to which he belonged derived its name. He was the second son of Veit zu Pappenheim, Lord of Treuchtlingen and Schwindegg, and his second wife Maria Salome von Preysing-Kopfsburg. He was educated at Altdorf and Tübingen, and subsequently traveled in southern and central Europe, mastering the various languages, and seeking knightly adventures. His stay in these countries led him eventually to adopt the Roman Catholic faith in 161 ...
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Ernst Von Mansfeld
Peter Ernst, Graf von Mansfeld (german: Peter Ernst Graf von Mansfeld; c. 158029 November 1626), or simply Ernst von Mansfeld, was a German military commander who, despite being a Catholic, fought for the Protestants during the early years of the Thirty Years' War. He was one of the leading mercenary generals of the war. Biography Mansfeld was an illegitimate son of Count Peter Ernst von Mansfeld (1517–1604), a member of the comital House of Mansfeld and royal Spanish stadtholder. He was raised in the Catholic faith at his father's palace in Luxembourg. He gained his earliest military experiences during the Long War in Hungary, where his elder half-brother Charles (1543–1595), also a soldier of renown, held a high command in the imperial army. While his brother succumbed to an epidemic within short time, young Ernst stayed at the theatre of war for several years. In the War of the Jülich Succession he served under Archduke Leopold V of Austria, until that prince's ingra ...
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Battle Of Nördlingen (1634)
The Battle of Nördlingen (german: Schlacht bei Nördlingen; es, Batalla de Nördlingen; sv, Slaget vid Nördlingen) took place on 6 September 1634 during the Thirty Years' War. A combined Imperial-Spanish force inflicted a crushing defeat on the Swedish- German army. By 1634, the Swedes and their Protestant German allies occupied much of southern Germany and blocked the Spanish Road, an overland supply route used by the Spanish to funnel troops and supplies from Italy to support their ongoing war against the Dutch Republic. In order to regain control of this, a Spanish army under Cardinal-Infante Ferdinand linked up with an Imperial force led by Ferdinand of Hungary near the town of Nördlingen, which was held by a Swedish garrison. A Swedish-German army commanded by Gustav Horn and Bernhard of Saxe-Weimar marched to its relief but they significantly underestimated the number and calibre of the Imperial-Spanish troops facing them. On 6 September, Horn launched a series ...
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Battle Of Breitenfield (1631)
The Battle of Breitenfeld (german: Schlacht bei Breitenfeld; sv, Slaget vid Breitenfeld) or First Battle of Breitenfeld (in older texts sometimes known as Battle of Leipzig), was fought at a crossroads near Breitenfeld approximately 8 km north-west of the walled city of Leipzig on 17 September (Gregorian calendar), or 7 September (Julian calendar, in wide use at the time), 1631. It was the Protestants' first major victory of the Thirty Years War. The victory confirmed Sweden's Gustavus Adolphus of the House of Vasa as a great tactical leader and induced many Protestant German states to ally with Sweden against the German Catholic League, led by Maximilian I, Elector of Bavaria, and the Holy Roman Emperor Ferdinand II. Preliminaries The Swedish phase of the Thirty Years War began when Gustavus Adolphus and his force of 13,000 landed at Peenemünde in 1630. Initially, Sweden's entrance into the war was considered a minor annoyance to the Catholic League and ...
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Mercenary Soldiers
A mercenary, sometimes also known as a soldier of fortune or hired gun, is a private individual, particularly a soldier, that joins a military conflict for personal profit, is otherwise an outsider to the conflict, and is not a member of any other official military. Mercenaries fight for money or other forms of payment rather than for political interests. Beginning in the 20th century, mercenaries have increasingly come to be seen as less entitled to protections by rules of war than non-mercenaries. The Geneva Conventions declare that mercenaries are not recognized as legitimate combatants and do not have to be granted the same legal protections as captured service personnel of the armed forces. In practice, whether or not a person is a mercenary may be a matter of degree, as financial and political interests may overlap. Modern mercenary organizations are generally referred to as private military companies or PMCs. Laws of war Protocol Additional GC 1977 (APGC77) is a ...
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